Food molds are well known. A common baking pan is a food mold, with one open end, one closed end and a peripheral side wall. The closed end and side wall define a hollow volume that will become the three-dimensional shape of a food product molded by the baking pan.
Some food pans, such as a baking pan for making angel food cake, have an annular hollow volume at the open end. In use, the annular hollow volume is filled with a food composition and then baked. After baking, the pan is inverted to remove the annularly shaped food composition from the open end. Thus, the open end is used to form the bottom of the final food product.
Some invertable food molds have a centrally located indentation at the closed end. With a mold of this type, a first food composition may be placed and formed in the open end, and a second food composition may be placed in the complementary shaped indentation at the closed end. This provides a precise fit for the second, filler food within the first, supporting food composition.
Miller U.S. Pat. No. 1,388,364 and Naugle U.S. Pat. No. 1,476,910 each show a baking pan with an indentation in the end wall at the closed end. The pan may be inverted and the indentation at the closed end side of the end wall may be filled to form a filler composition which is complementarily shaped for receipt within a food composition molded by the open end of the pan, on the opposite side of the end wall.
In forming a food product of two food compositions, it is sometimes desirable to conceal one of the food compositions. Bangert U.S. Pat. No.4,009,859 shows a baking pan of two mold halves, each with a recess. The halves are combinable so that the recesses form one hollow volume for receiving the filler material.
While a food mold of this type may be used to produce a two composition food product wherein one of the food compositions is a filler concealed within an outer shell formed by the other food composition, practicalities severely limit the sizes and shapes of the final food products which may be produced by molds of this type and the types of food which may be used with molds of this type. Primarily, the outer shell is usually relatively weak and susceptible to collapsing into the filler, resulting in a food product which may not look very appetizing.
Another problem involves the cutting of a two composition food product into serving portions. Frequently, during cutting of one or more serving portions, the outer shell of the remaining portions will sag down into the filler and cause the filler to ooze out the sides. As a result, during and after cutting, the food product may not look very appetizing and may even become quite messy, depending on the relative weights of the two foods.
It is an objective of this invention to expand the present range of two composition food products into a variety of different, sturdy shapes.
It is another objective of the invention to expand the range of types of food which may be formed into a variety of shapes to produce an appetizing, composite food product.
The objectives of this invention are achieved by providing a food mold with an end wall having at least one indentation at a closed end. The indentation resides inside an unindented peripheral portion of the end wall and substantially surrounds an unindented central portion of the end wall. The indentation defines at least one hollow volume between these unindented portions.
The open end of the end wall may be used to make a shell from a first food composition. The shell has a raised center column which corresponds to the unindented central portion of the end wall, a raised peripheral wall which corresponds to the unindented outer peripheral central portion and a hollow volume therebetween which corresponds to the indentation in the opposite side of the end wall. On the opposite side of the end wall, at the closed end of the pan, the indentation may be used to make a complementarily sized and shaped filler from a second food composition. This filler takes the shape of the hollow volume defined by the indentation. After the shell and the filler have been removed from the opposite sides of the pan, the filler may be placed in the complementarily shaped hollow volume of the shell.
This constitutes a first half of the final food product. The second half is formed in the same manner, but then one of the halves is inverted and stacked onto the other so that the filler sections and the column sections of the two halves are in alignment. This results in a two composition food product with a filler that is completely concealed by the outer shell. More importantly, a continuous column of the first food composition extends vertically between the top and bottom shell halves to support the middle of the food product. Compared to prior two composition foods, the construction made by this pan is sturdier and has a reduced susceptibility to sagging.
In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the outer side wall and the peripheral portion of the end wall are octagonal in transverse cross-section. At the closed end, eight unindented dividers extend from the corners of an unindented peripheral octagon to an unindented central portion. The end wall is indented to provide eight recessed portions, and each recessed portion is surrounded by the unindented central portion, the unindented peripheral portions and two of the unindented dividers. Interior walls depend downwardly from the peripheral portion, the central portion and the dividers, thereby defining eight hollow volumes located around the central portion and inside the peripheral portion.
The open end side of the end wall is used to form a shell with eight recesses, and the closed end side of the end wall is used to form a complementarily filling of eight separate sections. When formed, the eight fillings are placed in the eight recesses of the shell to produce one composite half of the final composite food product.
To form the final composite food product, one of the two composite halves is inverted and stacked onto the other, as described previously. This aligns the outer walls, the center portions and the dividers of the two halves. The resulting two composition food product has eight separate filled pieces which are trapezoidal in cross section, the positions of which are determined by the locations of the dividers.
By cutting this composite food product along the lengths of the dividers to form separate serving portions, each serving portion will include an outer shell of the first food composition which completely surrounds a filler section of a second food composition. Because of this construction, the filler does not flow out from the shell during cutting and serving of the serving portions. Moreover, because each of the filler sections is isolated, each serving portion within the shell is relatively well insulated. The temperature of the second, filler food composition may be kept at an elevated or a reduced temperature for a longer period of time.
The food mold or pan of this invention may be used with a wide variety of food products. While it may be readily appreciated that this food mold may be put to advantageous use in forming desserts, such as pies, or cakes filled with ice cream, yogurt, cream cheese, pudding or jello, it is also to be understood that the pan may be used to form other, nondessert food products. It is also to be understood that this food mold may be for any number of different types of food preparation such as baking, freezing, gelling and steaming.